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| 1936 presidential election | |
  Nominees Roosevelt and Garner | |
| Convention | |
|---|---|
| Date(s) | June 23–27, 1936 |
| City | Philadelphia,Pennsylvania |
| Venue | Convention Hall Franklin Field |
| Candidates | |
| Presidential nominee | Franklin D. Roosevelt of New York |
| Vice-presidential nominee | John N. Garner ofTexas |
| ‹ 1932 · 1940 › | |
The1936 Democratic National Convention was held inPhiladelphia,Pennsylvania from June 23 to 27, 1936. The convention resulted in the nomination ofPresidentFranklin D. Roosevelt andVice PresidentJohn N. Garner for reelection.
At the 1936 Democratic Convention, the rule requiring candidates forpresident andvice president to have a majority of two-thirds of the delegates votes to win nomination, which had existed since 1832, was abolished.
Roosevelt had long pushed for the rule's abolition, in part due to past deadlocks: for example, the1924 convention had required 103 ballots over roughly two weeks to nominateJohn W. Davis.[1]
The conventioneers provided that a simple majority of delegates would be required to win nomination, allowing for candidates to more easily be nominated and thus produce less balloting. In this regard, only one Democratic Convention after 1932 has required multiple ballots (that of1952, which required three).
This also began the decline of theSouth's clout at Democratic conventions, making it easier for the Democrats to begin adoptingcivil rights and other liberal ideas into theirplatforms, since the two-thirds rule had long given the South ade facto veto power on presidential nominees.
With the rule's abolition, Missouri SenatorBennett Champ Clark noted that "the Democratic Party is no longer a sectional party, it has become a great national party."[1] Southern Democrats would continue to decline in power,[1] ultimately leading to theDixiecrat movement and Nixon's 1968Southern strategy.
South Carolina SenatorEllison D. Smith walked out of the convention once he saw that a black minister,Marshall L. Shepard, was going to deliver the invocation.[2]
The Balloting:
| Democratic National Convention presidential vote, 1936 | |
|---|---|
| Candidates |  |
| Name | Franklin D. Roosevelt |
| Certified Votes | Voice Vote(100.00%) |
| Margin | 0 (0.00%) |
President Roosevelt and Vice President Garner were renominated by acclamation without need for a roll-call vote.
In his acceptance speech on June 27 at the adjacentFranklin Field, Roosevelt remarked, "This generation of Americans has a rendezvous with destiny."[3]
| Preceded by 1932 Chicago, Illinois | Democratic National Conventions | Succeeded by 1940 Chicago, Illinois |
